


The Best Friend Ever

by afteriwake



Series: Academy Days [3]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Academy Era, Angry James T. Kirk, Depressed Leonard "Bones" McCoy, Drunk Leonard "Bones" McCoy, Emotions, Gen, Hangover, Hurt/Comfort, James T. Kirk is a Good Friend, Mentioned Joanna McCoy, POV Alternating, POV James T. Kirk, POV Leonard "Bones" McCoy, Past Relationship(s), Photographs, Poor Bones, Sleeping James T. Kirk, Starfleet Academy, Touched Leonard "Bones" McCoy, missed birthdays
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-10
Updated: 2018-09-10
Packaged: 2019-07-10 20:07:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 792
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15956588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afteriwake/pseuds/afteriwake
Summary: Kirk walks into his dorm room to find a drunk Bones missing his daughter and he resolves to do something about it. When Bones wakes up, he sees just what Kirk is capable of when it comes to being a good friend.





	The Best Friend Ever

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Dreamin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dreamin/gifts), [GreenSkyOverMe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreenSkyOverMe/gifts).



> I felt like updating this series when I saw a non-specific prompt sent to me by **Dreamin** (" _'She hasn't spoken to me in years.'_ ") that would fit well with the implied existence of McCoy's daughter in the AOS verse. Enjoy some angst!

It was with surprise that Kirk found Bones in _his_ room, a half-empty bottle of whiskey on the desk. The good stuff, too, with the high alcohol content. Far as he knew, Bones had clinic duty this afternoon, but if he was any judge on how drunk a person was, Bones was two swigs close to passing the hell out in a drunken stupor. “You okay?” Kirk ventured, asking softly in case he had a raging headache and approaching his friend slowly, taking soft steps.

“Jo’s birthday,” he replied, hiccuping the sentence slightly. Considering when they’d met a few months ago he’d been drunk, this was nothing like that. Then, on the shuttle, he’d been angry and drunk. Now he was just...sad.

And that sentence explained why.

Kirk sat on his bed and then after a moment got up and stood by Bones. Bones looked up and Kirk nodded to the bed. Normally he expected his friend to argue but Bones got up and unsteadily walked the short distance to the bed. Kirk picked up the bottle of whiskey and took a swig before moving his chair closer to the bed and passing it to Bones. “The harpy won’t let you talk to her today, will she?” 

Bones leaned back so his back was resting against the wall, or at least his shoulders were, and nodded. "She hasn't spoken to me in years." He scrunched up his eyebrows. “The harpy kicked me out two years ago. Right before her birthday. Haven’t spoken to my little girl since. I thought since she was thirteen now...” He took the bottle and took a larger swig than Kirk had, then sat up again and passed it back.

“You deserve to tell your daughter happy birthday,” Kirk said, getting angry. Not at Bones; no, at the woman who was keeping his daughter from him. A guy who hated space being pushed out into joining Starfleet because of the shit she’d pulled, that was one thing. Kirk disliked her but had never entirely hated the woman because hey, Bones was probably his best friend in the universe, even in these few short months, and they wouldn’t have met anyway.

But keeping someone from his kid who he loved dearly? That was utter bullshit.

Kirk was going to say more but he looked over and saw Bones slumped uncomfortably on the bed. Kirk set the bottle down on the floor and got to arranging Bones in a more comfortable position on the bed, pulling the blanket up over him and making sure there was a wastebasket if needed. Then he moved the chair back, taking the whiskey with him and having another swig. There had to be _something_ he could do. But what?

****

\---

Bones felt like cotton was stuffed in his ears and down his throat, and his eyes felt like they were filled with grit. Jesus, how much had he drank? He’d known today was going to be bad, but…

Why the hell wasn’t he in his own bed?

He pushed the blanket off, looking around the darkened room. Right. Jim’s room, the one he shared with the twerp, the reason he kept commandeering his own place. His second bottle of whiskey had gone to make sure the twerp didn’t bother him and then the good one…

He looked around and spotted the empty bottle next to a sleeping Kirk, who had his arms folded on his desk in front of a photo cube on his desk.

Idiot. He was going to get neck pains sleeping like that.

Except...well, he’d been in Kirk’s bed. Tucked in carefully, too. Really, there were times he wondered who the hell he’d please to get a friend like Jim in his life.

He went to go shake Kirk’s shoulder and then he saw the first picture on the cube. It was Joanna, looking bigger than she had since the last time he’d seen her. And she was waving. He smiled as he looked at it, and then began flicking through the pictures. All of his daughter, from birth to what he assumed had been the last two years. And then there was one last picture, looking like it had been taken around the time of the last one.

Joanna held up a sign with rather nice handwriting that said “Daddy, I miss you. Five more years then I can join you in San Francisco! Love you, Daddy!”

He almost sobbed at it but held it back, a wide smile on his face instead. Dammit, he must have made someone _really_ happy to get a friend like Jim in his life, he realized. Maybe he’d bend the room rules at his place for a week or so in thanks…

Maybe.


End file.
